It has become common practice for chefs in restaurants, and even in many homes, to use hand-held propane torches to singe or otherwise surface-roast cooked hams and other products to produce colors and color patterns, to caramelize honey, caramel, sugar glaze, or other surface coatings, and/or for other purposes.
Unfortunately, no automated continuous commercial apparatus or procedure has been available which is capable of producing products which faithfully resemble the products produced in restaurants and homes using hand-held propane cooking torches. Efforts to produce similar results using continuous infrared and convective ovens, for example, have been unsuccessful because, unlike the torch flame which physically enters into cracks or crevices when impinged or otherwise applied on the product surface, infrared or convective heat does not fully “see” into such surface features and anomalies and does not provide the same intense heating and temperature at the product surface as a torch flame.
Consequently, in order to produce ready-to-eat hams and other products for delicatessens and supermarkets having the same surface appearance and/or other characteristics, it has been necessary for the commercial suppliers to also manually treat the surface of each ham or other product piece on an individual basis using a hand-held torch. This is not only a time-consuming and costly process, but also poses a serious safety hazard for the employees performing the hand roasting operation and for other workers in the processing facility.
Consequently, a need exists for an automated continuous apparatus and method for producing comparable surface-roasted hams and other products wherein the automated apparatus and method will preferably eliminate the need for manual procedures using hand-held torches yet produce the same surface effects and other results.